I have this habit of keeping browser tabs open and mails unarchived until I have blogged off the links that they contain (or reminded me of). And I really have to clean up my browser and mail window... so here you go.

A nice little video (well, not so little, with 15 min running time) about how linen is made today. There's plenty of newfangled machines, but there's also plenty of manual work involved.


BE LINEN MOVIE from Linen and hemp community on Vimeo.


If you don't want to watch the whole thing, here's a link to the short version (4.5 minutes).

There's a beautiful silk pouch with tassels on blogged by Medieval Silkwork. It's yummy.

And now for something completely different. I really cracked up over this post from The Bloggess, featuring a giant metal chicken. (Yes, I'm easily amused.) I stumbled over it via this video of her giving a speech and setting off the Zombie Apocalypse in Utah.

Now my browser has four less tabs open. Unfortunately, all the rest requires some proper action by me... which I'll be off to do now.

First of all, I'm back from Leeds, and I got or did everything that makes a conference: a conference pack (though it didn't include a pen, nor a writing pad), meeting new people, a few mindboggling papers, ideas for future projects, too much caffeinated hot drinks, book buying, and one night where I stayed up way, way past bedtime to chat with colleagues. That said, I'll give a more extensive review of the academic part in another post.

And I also learned things about Britain. For example that they have developed a really nasty habit of adding sweeteners to sugary soft drinks. And why on earth does anybody want to add sweeteners to a sugary drink? I just don't get it (and it tastes nasty). I like to have one of these sugary soft drinks once in a while, even if they are bad for you. But let's take one. There are two reasons why people drink it: To get the sugar or to get the taste. Or both. (The liquid is an added benefit, yes.) So I understand having a drink with sweeteners for those who only want the taste, even though that changes with the substitution. (In that case, I personally would choose a different drink then, but that's me.) But sugar and sweetener? Please. That's just stupid. Sweeteners are bad for the system, and I believe they are even worse than the sugars, who are undisputedly not the healthiest thing to consume (as one of the Leeds papers also showed with a nice graph correllating caries cavity frequency and sugar consumption over the last three or so centuries). They'll tell your body "calories come here! calories ahoy!", which then proceeds to get some insulin ready for the sugary bounty - which never comes, making your blood sugar levels plummet to new depths and the body react with the feeling of hunger. Which will lead to exactly the opposite effect of what the "diet" drinks promise you.

It took me several drinks to find out that they really do it to every sugary soft drink, after which point I stuck to either water or pure juice.

I also learned, unfortunately, that it is not possible to buy teabags at Manchester Airport. There's no real supermarket there (nor at the airport station). So I had to go home without a stash of teabags to replenish our quickly dwindling supply of Yorkshire tea (which really, as it promises, works splendidly in hard water), and we'll have to buy PG tips or something in a turkish grocery store when we run out. I also did not get lemon curd, because I was not willing to pay almost 6 quid for one glass - thanks, but for that price, I'll cook it myself. (Hint: it's not really hard to do.)

And I learned even more. That I'm not your classic conference-going medievalist, because then I should have checked my email about daily on the conference. (I firmly believe that the Out-of-Office autoreply was invented so that I can have times without having to check my email. And that includes conferences as well as vacation times.) That I'm not able of doing basic grocery shopping after doing bookshopping in a proper, large Waterstone's. That amazon.com has bought thebookdepository.co.uk (those *insert nasty new favourite swearword, also learned in Leeds, here*!) and I thus have to find yet another supplier of books. That the English rail system and especially their way of showing platforms and destinations on the tables in the station is really, really special and not at all what you are used to as a German. And that I really like duck with cherry sauce (part of the medieval theme dinner).

It's really nice and summery here - the strawberries are ripening, peonies and the rose are in bloom as well as a gazillion of other plants, and the tomatoes are doing their best to get nice and plump.

Apart from that, of course there's a lot of plants that grow where they are not really supposed to grow, so a part of yesterday evening was spent in the garden, doing necessary work. Among this was cutting back all the dog rose shoots and stems that were threatening to suffocate the "real" rose - which means that of a huge bush of greenery with thorns, three meager stems are left. But at least one of the stems is blooming, and it's now much easier to eliminate unwanted plants from below the rose.

And while I'm talking about garden stuff... here is my latest gardening insight: Neither tomatoes nor strawberries will turn red faster if you tell them dirty jokes. Which is a pity, really...

Well, not only German - the Austrians have it as well, but it's not that common in most other countries. Even though it's so nice...


What I am talking about? The Schorle. In case you never heard about it, a Schorle is a mixed drink consisting of about half (carbonated) water and half something else - the most typical non-alcoholic Schorle would be the Apfelschorle (water and apple juice), but there's lots of other juices used for Schorle as well. You can also get Schorle in the alcoholic version, with either red or white wine mixed with water.

During NESAT in Esslingen, I was a little surprised that a lot of the non-Germans and non-Austrians didn't really know the concept. One Swede actually professed getting addicted to this Schorle stuff - and I can understand that: it's really neat. You get a large drink that has some sparkle and a lot of taste, but is not as sweet-and-sticky as pure juice would be. And Apfelschorle, mixed with three quarters water and one quarter juice, is about isotonic as well (says the German wikipedia, which, in contrast to the English wikipedia, has a lot to say about the topic).

When I was younger, there was a different Schorle version quite usual as well: Applejuice mixed half-and-half with lemonade (the sweet clear carbonated "lemon"-flavored kind), the so-called "Apfelschorle süß" (süß means sweet) in contrast to the "Apfelschorle sauer" (sour, you probably guessed it). It seems, however, that everybody ordered the sour kind mixed with water, since the sweet version has about disappeared from menus everywhere now. A while ago, we found a menu where the sweet kind was still printed, and everyone on the table sort of went "Wow, they still have that??"

So... in case you are looking for a nice summer drink that's healthier than pure juice or soft drinks, but still has taste - and does quench thirst very nicely - you might want to try this Schorle stuff. I've been having it all my life, and if I'm not in need of a caffeine jolt, it's still my staple order in a restaurant or pub. And I think it's an idea worth spreading.

I stumbled across this yesterday, and it's so weird that I just have to share it with you.

Here you go: A WTF lamb.

I'm back from a wonderful long weekend spent upholding a nice tradition - once a year, I meet up with a small group of likeminded folks to do some bookbinding. This year, for a change, I had no huge list of things that I really needed (or wanted) to get done during the weekend - and since I was quite tired, I did not have such an output as in some of the previous years... but nice chats with people I only see once a year, and I made a few boxes and a protector for knitting pattern sheets that I take with me - and a new "conference book".

Back in 2008, I decided that it would be really nice to have notes from conferences in one book instead of on this and that notepad or this and that single sheet of paper. So in May 2008, I made myself a bright green book, a bit larger than DinA4 (that was a happy accident - I wanted A4 and did not really measure after cutting the bound block) and slim enough to easily lug it to conferences. I have since taken it to every one I went to except one, where I left it at home, and it's filled up almost completely now (I blame the last NESAT, where I took copious notes). I suspect it will still last for Leeds, but after that, I really need a new one.

So I made one - with the same measurements, a tad thicker, and with bright colours. It's the yellow-cloth-and-seventies-wallpaper bound book that you see in the front of the picture - and behind it is a box to hold my wool combs.


And now it's back to normal work - like trying to get the webshop to run, and finishing the spinning I have to do.

This Thursday was a holiday here in Germany, and thus we have a long weekend - so you get no proper blog post today. Instead, I hope you find this just as amusing as I did...


Regular blogging (where I'll try harder to write about things interesting to you) will resume on Monday.